Cold Seas, Heavy Metal, Warm Hearts
by SsilverStreak
Summary: Ivan was just being nice when he handed the woman back her dropped coat. And now he's accidentally married to a (ridiculously cute) selkie. See, this is why people shouldn't mess with the Fair Folk.
1. Chapter 1

"Hey, miss? You dropped your coat."

The woman, short and plump and adorable with her multicolored braids, startled and stared at Ivan in shock as he bent down with a grunt and scooped up the furry coat that had fallen out of the backpack on the back of her chair after she pulled out a binder. It was kitten-soft against his hands, silvery and gunmetal gray and snowy white in a pattern that pinged _something_ in the back of his head, but he wasn't sure what. Still, he offered it to the seated woman with a shy smile.

Aaaand she was still staring at him, eyes wide even as her hands automatically came up to take the coat from him and clutch it tightly to her chest.

And then, for some reason, she squeaked and blushed bright red as before burying her face in her coat.

"Ooookay. I'm. Just. Going to go back to studying," Ivan stammered out awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. "So, um… yeah." Unsure what else to do, he gave a small wave before turning to head back to his table and textbooks.

A little odd, but she had definitely been cute.

"Um, excuse me…"

Ivan looked up from his textbook, wearily rubbed at his eyes, then blinked at the young woman standing nervously beside his table. "Oh, you're the girl from yesterday."

"Yes, um…" she squeaked, then hurriedly offered him something small in both hands, eyes squeezed tight.

Okay, she was too adorable for words.

Hesitantly, Ivan plucked the small object out of her hands and examined it.

It… looked like a ring box. A _lot_ like a ring box.

Maybe because it was one.

Look, he had been studying way too long by now because midterms were a bitch, okay?

A little more hesitantly, Ivan opened the box.

That was... a very shiny ring. _Very_ shiny. Were those sapphires? Ivan knew absolutely nothing about gems but those looked like sapphires.

"Uh… is this an engagement ring?" Ivan's mouth said without consulting his brain first.

"Uh-huh!" The woman's cheeks were red, but she seemed to be on a roll. "I thought that since you're human, we could get married according to human customs, too."

"… _What?!"_

About ten minutes of trying to get his brain to reboot later, Ivan was sitting at a table in the corner of the campus library across from the young woman, fiddling with a bottle of water she had pulled out of her backpack and given to him. A flash of silvery-grey had proven that the weird coat was back in there.

"So… an explanation would be… _really_ nice right about now… um… I'm sorry, I don't think you've told me…"

"Oh!" The woman flushed, fiddling with the end of one of her braids, a blue one. "I'm Mylene."

"Ivan."

Mylene nodded, then took a deep breath. "Okay, so, um… long story short… I'm a selkie."

"What in the world is a selkie?"

"Sometimes we're also called silkies, although that word is pretty rare these days."

At Ivan's blank look, Mylene pouted, and Ivan really wished that it didn't somehow make her even more adorable. It was hard to be irritated with someone when they were so cute he just wanted to hug them. Also he was going to very firmly ignore that desire right now. "I should have expected that, we're not very well known here in France." She took a deep breath and went back to fiddling with her braid. "So, basically, I can turn into a seal."

Ivan blinked. "Like a mermaid, or a werewolf?"

She gave him a stern look that was about as intimidating as a kitten. "Absolutely not." She shook her head and muttered "Stupid popular species," under her breath, then turned back to him. "I just put my sealskin on, and turn into my seal form. I take it off, and I'm in my human form."

"… Did I hit my head and not remember?"

"… No?"

Ivan looked around. "Okay, is this being filmed? Some sort of joke for one of those TV shows?"

Mylene's jaw dropped slightly, then she huffed and smacked her hands down on the table, making Ivan jump from the loud bang. "I'm not joking!"

"Shh!"

Mylene jerked and flushed as a group a couple tables over shushed them, then turned back to Ivan. "Look, I can prove it tonight," she continued, softer again. "At the pool in the campus rec center, after it closes. Eleven PM."

"How-"

"A friend got me a key so I could get some swimming in at night, since Paris is so far from the ocean and I am _not_ about to dunk myself in that gross thing you people call a river."

Ivan gave Mylene a flat look. "And why should I show up?"

Mylene dropped her head into her hands with a low groan and fussed with the bandanna covering the start of her colorful braids. "And that's what I needed to talk with you about."

She looked so upset and distressed that Ivan was reaching over to gently rub a large hand over her upper back in a clumsy attempt at comfort before he even realized it. He blushed as she peeked up at him, and pulled away with a mumbled "Sorry."

"No, it's… I don't mind…" She flushed and straightened up. "I was hoping you would believe me about the selkie part before we got to this part, since it's kind of… _really_ important."

Mylene looked down again, then pouted and seemed to force herself to meet his eyes. Ivan tried to tell himself that it was _not_ cute.

Yeah, he didn't even believe himself at this point.

"Look, in selkie culture… our skins are _really_ important. They're the source of our magic. A lot of our culture revolves around them, and a good chunk of that culture is about humans interacting with our skins. Do you follow me so far?"

Mylene was so serious and intent that Ivan found himself nodding before he realized it.

"Good. In the past, humans would sometimes steal our skins and hide them, and make the selkie marry them because they couldn't leave."

Forgetting, at least for the moment, that Mylene was talking about things that shouldn't exist, Ivan's jaw dropped. "That's awful!"

"It was. But we couldn't exactly stop going on land or interacting with humans. So, a new law sprang up." Mylene flushed hard now, one hand coming up to fuss with her braids again. "Any human who got ahold of our skin, and gave it back of their own free will, would have proven themselves kind and trustworthy enough to… to marry."

Ivan's brain must have been lagging a step or two behind at this point. In his defense, he was still trying to get over the 'selkie' thing. "And what does that have to do with me?"

Mylene reached down and picked up her backpack, opening it up and fishing out the coat that he remembered from yesterday.

Only, now that she partially spread it over the table, fingers lovingly combing through the silvery fur, Ivan realized that it wasn't a coat at all.

It was a skin. A really big one.

And suddenly what Mylene was talking about seemed all too real.

"This is my skin. And when you handed it back to me yesterday after I dropped it, in selkie culture, you… I… _we're_ kinda… married now. And that's why I gave you the engagement ring."

And that's when Ivan's brain officially bluescreened.


	2. Chapter 2

Ivan wasn't sure why he had agreed to meet Mylene at the swimming pool in the campus rec center that evening.

By all rights, he should have listened to his common sense and stayed far away from the clearly crazy young woman. Whoever carried around an animal skin and claimed that they were married just because he had handed it back to her was probably someone he should avoid.

But… she had been so serious. She, at least, believed what she was saying.

And even if he knew it couldn't be real, looking into those sweet, warm golden-brown eyes…

Ivan almost, kinda wanted it to be true, just so that she wouldn't face inevitable heartbreak.

So maybe that was why he slouched through the chill darkness, around the side of the building to the side door that Mylene had told him about. He had been here before, to use the weight room, but Ivan wasn't much of a swimmer and so he had never visited the rec center's pool.

Looks like today was just full of firsts.

The rec center was closed for the night, but Mylene had told him to come around and she would meet him at one of the doors. Unfortunately, she had neglected to tell Ivan _which_ side, and so he ended up walking three-quarters of the way around the rec center before he spotted Mylene, standing just in the shadows by a pool of light cast around a door. She was fiddling with her phone, the brightness turned all the way down, but even so it took Ivan longer to see her than he thought it would. In fact, he nearly walked past before he realized someone was there.

And no, he did _not_ jump, thank-you-very-much. He just stepped on an uneven part of the ground and stumbled. Right.

"Sorry! I didn't mean to startle you!" Mylene squeaked, putting her phone away and reaching out to steady Ivan with one hand, although he didn't need it at this point.

"No, I just… stumbled," Ivan said, coughing slightly and looking away. "So, um…"

"Ah, right!" After a brief moment of fumbling in her pockets, Mylene pulled out a keyring, then selected one and stepped to the door to unlock it. "Like I said, I have a friend who got me a key, so as long as I don't make a mess…" She gave Ivan a shy smile as he stepped forward to open the door for her.

Look, it was a weird situation but that was no excuse to not be a gentleman, okay?

"So, don't mess things up, got it," Ivan said, hesitating briefly before following Mylene into the dark, chlorine-scented room. A moment later and lights flicked on overhead, though only every fourth lamp was lit. The pool itself had no lights on, leaving the water dim and the bottom only a suggestion.

Really, if you had seen one huge indoor pool you had seen them all, so Ivan barely glanced over it and the high-dive platform before turning to Mylene.

He almost squeaked, but his throat was suddenly tight at the realization that Mylene was pulling her shirt off. Yes, there was what looked like a one-piece swimsuit underneath, but he would have liked a little warning beforehand!

Mylene didn't seem to notice, too busy slipping her pants off and folding them along with her shirt to rest on one of the bleachers lining the long walls. She must have noticed Ivan's expression, and possibly how red he had gone, because she flushed and twiddled her index fingers together, looking down.

"Sorry, I can only wear something skin-tight while Changing. I mean, I _can_ with looser clothes, but they always make me feel uncomfortable."

Ivan swallowed past the tightness in his throat and took a careful step closer. "Mylene, I…"

He really should stop this before it went any further. Before he had to see the disappointment in her eyes when it didn't work.

But Mylene had already turned away and was pulling out that silvery animal skin, carrying it with her to the edge of the pool. "No matter what, know that I won't hurt you, okay?"

Ivan opened his mouth to tell her to stop, because he _really_ wasn't the greatest swimmer and having to rescue her from the pool if she got tangled in that skin probably wouldn't end well for either of them, but only got as far as "St-" before Mylene flung the heavy skin around her shoulders in a practiced movement. It snugged tightly around her body as her body flowed into motion, arching forward and into the water with only a small splash.

His breath caught in his throat, and Ivan was halfway to the edge of the pool before he even realized his legs were moving. He skidded to a halt and dropped to his knees beside the pool, focusing on the dark shape under the water.

Ivan let out a breath of relief, the terror holding his chest tight beginning to relax as the form grew larger and closer. Okay, as soon as Mylene surfaced he would help her out, _then_ he could give her a stern talking-to for trying to give him a heart attack.

The darkness broke the surface and rose up… and up… and up. Big, golden eyes set in a head larger than a bear's focused on him, even as the massive seal surged up higher than Ivan's own kneeling height, then braced itself against the edge with just its flippers, leaving the rest of the seal's body in the water.

And then it gave an open-mouthed 'grin', showing disturbingly long fangs and _why did a seal have fangs?!_

He dimly registered the spotted, silvery and grey coat before Ivan fell backwards and a scream tore out of his throat.

The seal jerked back, snorting in alarm, and then surged forward and _shimmered_ and suddenly Mylene was crouching over him, that spotted hide draped over her shoulders. "Are you okay?!"

"I… bwah… wha… seal… _teeth_ … _why fangs?!_ " Ivan babbled out, scrambling back and away from Mylene as it hit him that _she had not been kidding_ and _she really does turn into a fucking seal!_

Mylene blinked and looked honestly confused. "All leopard seals have fangs."

"You could have warned me that you turn into _an apex predator!_ "

Mylene flinched, and Ivan's chest squeezed as hot guilt shot through him. He tried to speak but had to swallow hard before his tight throat would let him. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have snapped like that."

Because even if she _was_ an apex predator, he still couldn't bring himself to hurt her feelings.

Mylene gave him a shy, but admonishing look. "I told you that I wouldn't hurt you."

"Sorry, I mean… I… I honestly didn't really believe you about the whole seal thing until you actually did it. And then you weren't some tiny, cute fuzzball, but something bigger than me!"

That earned a shy smile. "I probably should have warned you about how big I am."

Ivan smiled hesitantly in return. "I don't think I would have believed you." He cleared his throat, swallowed, then continued. "So, you really… that's really you in there. With those big teeth."

"I promise you, Ivan, I'm me, no matter what form I'm in. I just get a lot fuzzier."

Ivan glanced over the skin still draped over Mylene's shoulders, heavy and damp, and decided that if she was trusting him with this, the least he could do was extend a little trust in return.

"So… If you want, we could try that again. I'll do my best not to scream this time."

Once more he was rewarded with that shy, warm smile. "If it'll help, I'll stay back until you let me closer. I sometimes forget how big I am when I'm transformed."

That piqued his curiosity. "How big are you exactly?"

"A little over four meters. I know it's bigger than most leopard seals get, but selkies don't always conform exactly to our basic animal species," Mylene said as she stood, adjusting the skin around her shoulders.

Ivan stood as well and stepped back, giving Mylene space as she once again wrapped her skin tighter around her and slipped into the water. This time, when the large seal head broke the surface of the pool and puffed a breath at him, Ivan was able to stay quiet.

Barely.

Look, she was _huge_ , okay?

Mylene puffed a breath at him again, then trilled, a surprisingly light and playful sound from something so big. Ivan laughed softly, though he wasn't sure whether it was stress from the entire evening or just the fact that such a noise came from such a huge creature.

Mylene briefly dove, then resurfaced and trilled again. The sight of such a large creature acting, for lack of a better word, _adorable_ , drew Ivan closer to the edge of the pool. True to her word Mylene kept her distance, watching and occasionally slipping under the water for a few seconds as Ivan crouched by the edge of the water.

This earned him another sound, a soft call that Ivan could only call singing. He smiled and hesitantly dipped the fingers of one hand in the water. "Mylene?"

A soft chuff, and the leopard seal slowly drifted closer. Ivan appreciated the slow pace, even if he had to make a severe effort to keep the Jaws theme from playing in his head.

He was nowhere near successful on that matter.

Eventually a warm, damp head nudged up under his hand, and Ivan reflexively stroked down it. Mylene's fur wasn't like anything he had ever felt before, damp and dense with an odd, almost oily texture. Still, it wasn't entirely unpleasant, so he kept petting the oversized head. Ivan jerked back with a squeak as Mylene rose up a bit out of the water, but that turned out to be just so she could plop that massive head into his lap with a content croon.

Trying to ignore how his jeans were now soaked, Ivan went back to petting the selkie head in his lap as tension slowly drained out of him. After the shocks he had been through, he needed this bit of quiet.

He wasn't sure how long they stayed there, but both were shaken out of their reverie when Ivan's stomach growled. He gave a wry grin as Mylene slid back and chuffed at him, somehow expressing amusement even with her animal features. "Sorry, haven't eaten yet." A niggling thought teased at the back of his mind, and Ivan sighed. "Look, we need to talk. How about I take you to dinner? I know a good sushi place not far off campus."

Just as he was kicking himself for offering sushi to a seal and wondering whether that made him racist or species-ist or something, Mylene hauled herself out of the water next to him (while drenching him further in pool water), then with a shimmer slid her skin off of her shoulders.

"I'd love to."


	3. Chapter 3

Twenty minutes later, Ivan was seated across from Mylene in a booth at the aforementioned sushi place after they had placed their orders. Feeling awkward, he took a discarded straw wrapper and began to fiddle with it. Whatever courage had filled him at the pool seemed to have vanished.

The only thing that helped was the fact that Mylene looked as awkward as he felt.

"So… what's your major?" Ivan asked, mentally kicking himself as soon as the words left his mouth. How generic and clearly avoiding the real topic could he get?

Mylene jumped with a soft squeak, then put down the paper napkin she had been shredding and glanced up at him. "Um, Marine Biology."

Ivan blinked, more than a little surprised. If anything, he would have pegged her for nursing or creative writing or something similar. "Really?"

Mylene huffed at him, puffing her cheeks out in irritation, and she was so adorable that Ivan was pretty sure he was going to explode. Sitting here like this, in the light and far away from water, it was hard to believe he had ever been afraid of her at all. "What, you don't think I'm smart enough?"

"No, I mean yes, I mean-" Ivan stammered, holding his hands up defensively. "I'm sure you're more than smart enough, I was more asking about the whole… aquatic thing. What with you being, well… a selkie and all."

"Oh." Mylene blushed and looked down. "Well, I mean… I've always loved the ocean, it comes with the territory. And I like science and learning about things and, well… if I can combine the things I love, then why not? Besides, if I can get in with a research team that's all magicals, I could use my seal form while on expeditions and there aren't many better swimmers out there than selkies."

The way she lit up as she spoke was, well, magical. Ivan didn't even realize he was softly smiling until Mylene gave him an odd look, upon which he tried to cover it up with a small cough. "That, uh… that really does sound nice. I hope you get to do that someday." A thought occurred to him, and he gave a teasing grin. "Try not to eat your research subjects, though."

The selkie gave a soft snort of a laugh and playfully swatted at his arm. Even as he chuckled, Mylene hesitated, then looked down, going back to shredding the napkin again. "I'll only be able to do the shorter expeditions now…"

Ivan frowned. "Why? What's keeping you from going on long ones?"

"Well… and don't take this the wrong way… it's you."

"I'm not going to tell you what you can and can't do, really Mylene-"

"No, no, it's not that," Mylene interrupted, holding her hands up placatingly. Ivan settled back, still a little irritated at the mere thought of trying to control the young woman across from him. "I mean… it's part of the magic bond that was formed when you gave me my skin back. I literally _can't_ be away from you for more than a month or so at a time."

"You're _kidding._ "

"I wish I was." Mylene sighed, abandoning her pile of napkin fragments and getting a fresh one to start anxiously shredding. "It all comes down to, well, stories. My kind don't live in a vacuum, we influence humanity's stories about us, and those stories influence us in return. It can form a pretty vicious cycle. And trying to break free of those stories can backfire, often in ways you would have never imagined."

Ivan paused, mulling it over and holding it up against the myths he had looked up earlier that afternoon. "So, the stories about skins being stolen and trapping you on land…"

"My kind were trying to break away from that, but the magic warped, and now we have the current system. Trying to change it again could possibly leave us with something even worse, so now we have to wait for human stories about selkies to change before we try again." Mylene sighed and paused to take a sip of her drink. "At least this way, we have some measure of freedom. We're able to actually take our skins back from those who would try to steal them. We can spend time away from our spouses at sea before we have to come back. It's better than it was."

"Still, it seams like a system that's easy to abuse."

"Oh, it is." Mylene grimaced. "And while we can't hurt our spouses directly, well… no magic keeps us from asking our more powerful friends to turn an abusive spouse into, say, an equal volume of spiders."

More than a little horrified, Ivan asked "Is that one huge spider with the same mass as a human, or a bunch of spiders that add up to the mass of a human?"

"Yes."

Ivan stared at Mylene, who just looked back at him seriously. "… No, I meant-"

"And the answer is Yes. Trust me on this one."

"… So, don't piss off any friends of yours?"

"That would probably be wise." Mylene gave him a sheepish smile. "They're nice, they really are, but they get… protective… of everyone else in our social group."

"At least you know they're looking out for you," Ivan said, giving a slight smile in return before he realized it. Before he could continue, their food arrived, and a few moments were spent arranging things and taking their first bites of sushi.

Ivan swallowed, looking down and idly poking at a grain of rice that had fallen out of his bite when he picked it up. "… Mylene, I don't want to trap you into anything."

He tensed when a warm, soft, small hand hesitantly covered his, then gave a gentle squeeze. "I know, Ivan. It's not you, or me, it's the magic that's pushing us into this." Mylene shyly smiled at him. "I know it's not an ideal situation, but… we don't have to do things that married people do. I wouldn't even mind if you dated other humans, or got married to one. I just… if it's alright, I'd like to be friends, at least."

"What about you, though?" Ivan asked, suddenly worried for the small woman across from him, and about what she clearly _wasn't_ telling him. "Would you be able to live a regular life?"

Mylene shifted nervously under his questioning stare, then looked away. "… I can't get married to anyone else as long as this magical bond is in place," she admitted.

"… Okay, now that's just not fair to you," Ivan said, more than a little offended on Mylene's behalf.

"Trust me, I know," Mylene replied. She apparently realized that she had been rather hard on their napkin supply, and began to pile the scraps onto an empty tray.

"So, does the bond just… keep you from marrying anyone?" Ivan asked, picking up another piece of sushi and drowning it in soy sauce before popping it into his mouth.

"No, it's a little more complicated than that. I'm basically off limits to other Fae as long as you're alive. Sleeping around and open relationships and all that are really common among our culture, but only so long as you aren't married. Then you're expected to be loyal to your spouse, though dallying with humans isn't considered cheating." At Ivan's expression, she added "Trust me, I'm aware it doesn't make much sense when you get down to it. Welcome to Fae logic." Mylene sighed and nibbled at a piece of sushi without bothering with the chopsticks this time. "Most Fae… don't exactly have the highest opinion of humans. Anyways, due to the bond, as far as Fae customs and culture go, our marriage is considered the same as between two Fae. So, basically, I'm off limits until you die."

"And there's no loopholes or anything that we could do to get you out of this?"

"Well, considering that all of the ones I know of include an 'accident' befalling you, and neither of us want that…" Mylene trailed off.

"What was traditionally done to break off a marriage?" Ivan asked, though he suspected he already knew.

"Well, traditionally if we found our skins after they were hidden, we were free to leave. This new system, while it allows us to keep our freedom in some ways, just makes it much harder to get out of if you don't want to harm the human you end up with."

"So, we don't have any options?"

"None that would end well for you. There's the magical divorce route, but that road also tends to lead to equal volume of spiders territory."

" _Why?!"_

"Because then you would be a liability," Mylene explained, pausing to take a sip of her water. "Right now, you're allowed to learn about the Fae because you're considered married to me. But if we got the divorce, then you would be an unattached human who still knows about the Fae. See where I'm going with this?"

Ivan winced. "Yeah, I think I get the picture." He sighed and looked down, toying with a small clump of rice using his chopsticks. "… This situation sucks."

"… Yeah, it kind of does," Mylene agreed with a sigh. "But it could be worse. I don't know you very well yet, but… you seem like a nice person. At least someone I could be friends with."

"Mylene, I don't want to keep you from finding happiness, though."

"Oh, it's not like it's forever to me. I just have to wait, what, five or six decades?"

"Five or six… Mylene, how old are you?"

The selkie blushed, going back to shredding a napkin. "Probably not too much older than you. Twenty-six… I think. Time passes oddly in the Fae realm, so it kinda becomes guesswork after a bit. Not that it makes much difference, once we hit adulthood our aging just kind of… stops. Barring an accident, I'm going to outlive you by a long time."

"Well, um… that's good." While Ivan was genuinely happy that he wasn't dooming Mylene to a lack of love for her entire life, it was pretty disconcerting to talk to someone long-lived enough to talk so flippantly about half a century of time.

Mylene seemed to realize she had made Ivan uncomfortable, to judge by how quickly and obviously she changed the subject. "So, you know my major. What's yours?"

"Oh, uh… music…" Ivan mumbled, looking down and rubbing the back of his neck.

"Music? That's really cool! What do you want to do?"

Unused to a response that wasn't some variation of 'you'll never make money with a degree in music', Ivan blurted out "Well, I'd like to teach lessons to kids, but I also like writing and composing my own songs, so being a songwriter on the side would be great." Ivan glanced up, only to find that Mylene was blushing for some reason. "Are you okay?"

"Fine, fine," she squeaked, not meeting his eyes as she shoved a piece of sushi in her mouth. Ivan blinked, then raised a brow. Mylene flushed further and went back to her decimation of the local napkin population. "Um, I… look, just… just look up leopard seal behavior when you get home, okay? Because I really don't want to explain it."

"… That's fair," Ivan conceded, finishing off his own roll of sushi. There had been a lot of things explained and laid bare tonight, he certainly wasn't going to push Mylene when it seemed like she had hit her limit.

"A-anyways… working with kids sounds nice. I think you'd be good at it."

"You think so? A lot of people tell me I'd just scare them."

Mylene shook her head. "You're a big guy, and you look rough, but… you're gentle. Trust me, from someone who's met actual monsters… you're a good person. Kids can sense that. You'll do fine."

They shared a shy smile, and Mylene finished her last piece of sushi as Ivan started to tidy up. "Would you like me to walk you home? It's pretty late, and, well…"

"… I would like that," Mylene said softly, not meeting his eyes as she made sure she had her duffle bag where her skin and a few other things were kept.

"If you want… I usually study in the library where we first met most afternoons," Ivan offered. Wait, did him asking make it a date? Did he want it to be a date? Mylene was definitely attractive, but he didn't want to push a relationship on her when she was the one stuck with him.

Deciding to let Mylene set the pace of whatever their relationship ended up being, he added "It would be nice to have a friend to study with."

A quick flash of something that almost seemed like disappointment crossed Mylene's face, but it was gone before it could really register as she beamed up at him. "That would be nice. I should introduce you to Nino, he's in the music program too, though I don't know if he's ahead of you or not."

"Is he another selkie?" Ivan asked, wordlessly offering to carry Mylene's duffle bag for her. She clutched it a little tighter, so he gave a soft smile and held his hands up to show he was fine with that. He didn't blame her in being cautious about her skin.

"No, he's a Ninki Nanka."

"A what-now?"

Mylene laughed, and it was a soft thing that had Ivan smiling before he realized it. "Yeah, he gets that a lot. They're… kinda dragon-like beings native to western Africa, though Nino has lived in Europe his whole life. They're pretty rare, even among Fae. They have a reputation for being cranky, but Nino is pretty chill. The only things that tend to get him mad are people being mean to those he cares about."

"What happens when he gets mad?"

"You don't want to know. Trust me."

The mention of another non-human in his own degree program had Ivan curious. "How many other… magical beings are going to our university?" he asked as he held the door open for her.

"I don't know the exact number, but we tend to congregate in our own friend groups. On the same floor of the apartment complex I live in, there's at least seven other magical beings. No other selkies, but my roommate, Alix, is a swan maiden."

That name at least rang a bell. "Isn't Alix that one girl with pink hair who's constantly challenging one of the rugby players to contests?"

"That's her." Mylene gave a small giggle. "Yeah, Alix has a bit of a reputation."

"I never would have thought that she's something as graceful as a swan."

"Have you ever _met_ a swan? They're always ready to throw down and fight. Alix channels it through doing martial arts and boxing and stuff like that, because humans tend to frown on someone just hauling off and punching people when they get mad."

That was probably for the best. "Is she a good roommate?"

"For the most part. She's messier than I am, but she doesn't complain much if I ask her to help tidy up, which is better than some roommates I've had."

"You said there were others on your floor?"

"Yeah, those would be Rose, Juleka, Alya, Marinette, Adrien, and Nino. There's one other apartment on our floor, but it's an elderly couple who are mostly deaf, and frankly they're too old to care if they see anything weird. They're sweet, so we try to look out for them."

"That sounds… really nice," Ivan said, knowing it was lame even as it came out of his mouth.

Mylene seemed to have a sixth sense for when something was wrong, as she gave him a searching look when they paused at a crosswalk to wait for the light. "What about you? What's your living situation like?"

"Uh…" Where would he start? Mom long gone, Dad either working or drunk and angry, and Ivan only coming back to scarf food and try to catch a few hours of sleep before going back out. Spending all of his time at work or class or studying, just to avoid going home?

Mylene didn't deserve having him dump all of that on her. "It's… okay. I live with my Dad, I can't afford an apartment right now." And even if his Dad was a grade A jackass, at least it was a roof over his head.

The eyes Mylene turned on him glowed softly in the darkness as they crossed the street, this part of the walk poorly lit and just making her gaze eerie and piercing, like she was seeing right through him. "I know you're lying to me, Ivan."

"I-" Those eyes stole the words from his mouth, and for a brief moment, Ivan knew what it was like having the full attention of a being that was ancient and terrible.

And then Mylene's expression softened as they passed under a streetlamp, stealing the glow away and leaving her as 'normal' as him. "If you're not comfortable telling me, that's alright. Just tell me, though. Don't feel like you have to lie about it."

Ivan nearly sagged in relief, and he nodded dumbly as Mylene turned towards a stairway in the building they had come to. "Sorry, we're on the third floor and the elevator has been broken for months now. We keep asking for it to be fixed, but every time they send a tech out, it just breaks again within a day."

"It's fine, I don't mind the climb." The apartment he lived in with his dad was on the fourth floor, and while they didn't have _quite_ so many problems with their elevator, it certainly felt like it at times.

Conversation paused as they climbed, and once on the right floor Mylene led Ivan to the second to last door along the walkway, where she paused. Ivan gave a small, awkward smile, not sure what to say after what had been probably the craziest day in his life.

It looked like Mylene was having the same trouble, as she fiddled with her fingers and wouldn't meet his eyes. "So, um… thanks for taking all of this as well as you did."

"What?" In what world had today been him taking all of this news _well_?

"I've heard stories of humans taking this _far_ worse. You freaked out a bit, but you didn't immediately try to go to the police or the news. Or worse."

The tone that dropped into her voice on the last word sent a shiver down his spine, and it took no imagination at all to figure out what she meant by that. His father alone…

Aaaand now that Ivan considered it, no way was he letting Mylene within a hundred meters of his old man. Though if there was anyone that he wouldn't feel _too_ sorry about getting turned into an equal volume of spiders…

"Well, I guess… this is goodnight?" He ventured out, in what was probably a blatant attempt to change the subject.

"… Yeah. Thanks for dinner." In a sudden move that made Ivan jump, Mylene darted forward, hugged him briefly, and then was through the door of her apartment before Ivan could say anything.

So… that was a thing that happened. And it was… nice. Especially the hug, Ivan wouldn't mind more of those.

Not bothering to wipe the goofy grin off of his face, Ivan turned to head back down the stairs.

Before he had gone three steps, a feeling he was being watched made the hair on the back of his neck prickle. He glanced around, but the only being he could see was a large, floofy cat sitting on the railing. In the low light it was hard to tell color, but it looked to be pale, with ginger points. The way the cat narrowed its eyes at him made it very clear that any attempts to pet would probably end with points of an entirely different kind embedded into his hand.

Still, the feeling didn't abate, and he grew more and more unnerved as he went down the stairs. Once he was out on the sidewalk, he breathed a sigh of relief. Maybe some sort of weird Fae spell to drive away humans?

He made it two more steps before something slammed into him, and then his back was against a (rather uncomfortable) brick wall with his feet dangling above the ground.

Ivan squeaked as two pairs of glowing eyes, one pair green and the other amber, glared up at him out of the night. The light from the streetlamp caught briefly on several lashing tails, one ginger and the rest dusky orange with white tips.

"So…" said one of the Fae holding him up, the one with amber eyes. "You're Mylene's new husband."

Oh, _fuck._


End file.
